


Sleep and His Half Brother Death

by ceywoozle



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Blow Job, First Kiss, First Time, HLV, M/M, Masturbation, Missing Scene, Nightmares, Sleep Walking, john watson can deep throat apparently, the great HLV gap, wonder where he learnt that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-28
Updated: 2014-05-04
Packaged: 2018-01-21 02:55:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 13,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1534964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceywoozle/pseuds/ceywoozle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John is fighting battles in his sleep and Sherlock doesn't know how to tell him, rearranging the world around him to keep it secret. One day John wakes up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

  * For [belle_of_the_fall](https://archiveofourown.org/users/belle_of_the_fall/gifts).



> This prompt is for belle-of-the-fall who requested sleepwalking and accidental confessions combined with BAMF soldier John.
> 
> Thank you to cartopathy for checking my tenses! All remaining errors are my own.
> 
> The title is stolen from William Waterhouse's painting by the same name.

The sitting room is turned upside down and for a moment Sherlock thinks there has been a stranger inside, someone searching. He runs through the list of hiding places in his head as he glances around, enumerating the things that people might actually be aware he has. He thinks of a sheaf of complicated formulas that he hasn't had time to get patented. He thinks of the large blue stone he probably should have returned. He considers the 1828 first edition Chemistry Manual but decides that it's too paltry a prize.

His eyes are skipping across the room, taking in the dining table turned on its side, its contents scattered across the room. The sofa torn apart, its cushions stacked, connecting the dining table to the sofa, oddly neat and purposefully arranged. The skull is missing and so is the jack knife, the correspondence flung across the hearth and his cigarettes sitting on his chair.

It takes him a minute to put these pieces together and he's slow, he's so unbearably slow. Has been since John had come back, since Mary had shot him, since Sherlock had come home from the hospital to find John waiting on the steps with his hands knuckled in his hair and his eyes wide and bruised. _Nightmares again. Hasn't been sleeping. Trying to go to work, to pretend it's all okay, that this is normal, that everything is fine._ But it's not. It's not fine and the lie John is trying to tell himself can no longer convince.

But there had been relief. Such overwhelming relief at seeing John that Sherlock hadn't even felt pity, not after that first brief ache. After that conversation with Mary, after Sherlock had been dragged back to the hospital, after he had had yet another surgery, he had woken up to find John with his hands clenched around his face and unable to look at him. For three days John hadn't left Sherlock's side, haunting the corners of the room, guilt and rage and shock painting lines on his face and causing his shoulders to hunch around his ears, tense and ready. For three days Sherlock didn't even care that John couldn't settle, that he paced and muttered and stood for hours just staring blankly out the window. It was John. It was John. John was here and that was all that mattered.

Then after three days he had walked over, given Sherlock's hand a quick squeeze, a terse smile tracing a crack across his face, then without a word he had turned around and walked away.

He hadn't come back.

It was two weeks before they let Sherlock go home and the whole time he had been consumed with fear, with worry. Not for the fragile flow of blood, the suddenly unreliable beat of his own heart so easily stoppable after all, but for John. He would have asked Mycroft but Mycroft hadn't come, so he had asked Lestrade, who looked sympathetic and made noises and Sherlock had wanted to throttle him, to scream and shake him because John was _missing,_ why couldn't he understand how important this was?

Climbing out of the taxi, feeling the lingering drift of the morphine, the dull ache that underlay everything, he had shuffled to the door of 221B feeling like death, fumbling with the key, scraping paint and brass before finally pushing it open. He had thought he was hallucinating when he had first seen that figure on the bottom step.

But no. The John of his mind is a little bit taller than life, his eyes a touch bluer, wearing brighter colours and tighter clothes. The John of his mind doesn't sit crouched on the stairs with his arms around his head as if warding off a blow. The John of his mind doesn't have eyes bruised and bloodshot from days of not sleeping. The John of his mind doesn't look at him like his entire life has been dragged down around him and he's standing in the rubble and covered in the blood of the people he failed to save.

No. This was John. And the pity Sherlock felt was quickly overwhelmed by relief.

He hadn't even said anything. He could read it all in the ruin of John's face. He walked to him and John had stared, his eyes glazed and unfocused, and for that moment they had been just two desperate men who had no idea what to do. Then Sherlock stepped around him, slowly climbing the seventeen stairs to the first floor landing, and behind him, he heard the shuffle and stumble as John did the same.

John hadn't even made it to the second floor. By the time Sherlock had come out with the tea (without milk, due to the biohazardous zone that was the refrigerator) John was sprawled across the sofa, his face slack with sleep. Sherlock put the cup down on the floor beside him and carefully adjusted the angle of his neck before finding his own bed.

Sherlock slept for ten hours that first night, and when he woke up, walking stiffly out into the sitting room, it seemed at first that John hadn't moved at all, except that beside him the teacup was empty.

He took a shower, sliding careful fingertips around the purple scars, still far too sensitive. The feeling of the shampoo on his scalp, the suds rising between his fingers, was as intense as an orgasm and he'd stayed there, standing under the spray and letting weeks of hospital air and insufficient spongings spiral slowly away under his feet.

When he came out, John was still sleeping, and after making another cup of milkless tea and putting it beside the sofa, he shuffled towards the door and down the stairs, hailing the first cab he had seen.

The drive to Mary's flat (and it was Mary's flat now) was the longest drive and the shortest drive Sherlock had ever taken. He had been both frightened and intrigued, dreading arriving and wanting it over with. When they arrived in Croydon he had told the cabbie to wait while he rang another floor. It had been a bored sounding woman who hadn't even questioned him before letting him in. He had climbed the steps far too slowly and when he arrived at Mary's door he had paused, an infinitesimal hesitation, before letting his knuckles rap a quick staccato on the wood.

In spite of himself, he had been unutterably relieved when there had been no answer. He had picked the lock, quickly and easily, and without lingering had gone straight to the bedroom, dragging whatever clothes he could find of John's into an old duffel he dug out of the back of the closet. He collected toothbrush and razor and the familiar hair product that Sherlock had almost stopped to sniff before mentally berating himself and tossing it on top of the pile. He had stopped only once on his way out to grab a stack of paperbacks that seemed familiar, then relocked the door and limped as quickly as he could back down the stairs.

He hadn't seen Mary at all but the whole way back to Baker Street his heart had been pounding.

John was awake when Sherlock returned, sitting on the edge of the sofa with his hair sticking out and his eyes puffy with sleep, but some of the slackness had gone from his face and the deep bruising somewhat faded. He had looked up, almost nervous as Sherlock had come in, but as soon as he had spotted the bag in Sherlock's hands he had stiffened, half rising and a hand reaching forward.

“Are you hurt?” he had demanded, his first words for weeks it seemed, his voice unpractised, trying to remember the rules of inflection and intent.

Regardless, Sherlock had felt the swell of pride that this had been the first thing John Watson had asked, had wanted to know. He had shaken his head, dropping the bag beside the door.

“She wasn't home.”

The relief on John's features had been palpable and Sherlock had felt another stab of pride.

“You bloody idiot,” John muttered. “You remember she tried to kill you, yeah?.”

He had looked closely at Sherlock for the first time then, eyes evaluating, checking over, the doctor in full force. “You shouldn't have gone out,” he concludes. “Come on, sit. I'll make tea.”

“No milk.”

John frowned. “Right. Yeah. No. Okay. I'll get some.”

“You're disgusting.”

“Yeah, thanks for that.”

“I mean, take a shower first. You'll feel better.”

He knew when John was trying not to grin. It was a far too familiar expression that left Sherlock trying not to grin right back. Regardless, he had felt the triumph rising up to join the pride, almost overwhelming him.

“I'll take it,” John had said, and stopped to grab his toothbrush, his razor, and his shampoo from the duffel bag before wandering off to the bathroom and closing the door.

That had been three weeks ago and Sherlock had thought they were doing fine. John is almost...well, normal, he had thought. It's true that his showers are a little longer, that he is watching more telly while paying less attention, that he has stopped leaving the flat entirely except to buy milk and, once, a case of beer that had been gone within twelve hours. But that was only that one time and since then not even the bottle of ancient scotch that stood in a top cupboard for emergencies had been touched.

No. John is normal. He doesn't even talk about Mary at all.

So it's not completely out of the question that Sherlock should take a minute, that he should fail to pick up the pieces and fit them into their obvious whole. But when he does, when he finally does, he walks carefully to where the table is overturned, its top facing the wall, the sofa cushions stacked up around it, and he knows now what they remind him of, that particular arrangement and placement, connecting the table and the sofa, delineating the room and building a fortress: sandbags.

So he is expecting it when he walks around the edge of the table to find John, sprawled on his side with the skull cradled to his chest, the jackknife on the floor beside his hand.

The first thing Sherlock does is take the knife, moving slowly so he doesn't disturb him. He picks up the correspondence and wedges it back in place, then as quietly and carefully as he can, he begins to straighten the flat. He replaces the sofa cushions and resettles the table, picking up every piece of paper, every random receipt and note, laying them carefully where they had been before.

When he is done, only John and the skull are out of place, and slowly, oh so slowly, Sherlock eases the skull away and puts it gently back on the mantle. The last thing he does is slot the cigarettes back into its jaw, then when he is sure that everything is exactly as it was, he goes back out into the hall, walks silently down the steps, and opens the front door.

He shuts it again with a slam that would have had Mrs Hudson scurrying out of her flat if she wasn't at her sisters this week. He stomps up the stairs and when he reaches the landing he goes into the kitchen, shutting the door behind him so firmly that the glass rattles ominously in its frame. He goes straight to the kettle, his back to the sitting room, and he makes more noise than he thought possible preparing tea. When he turns around, John is standing in the middle of the sitting room, a puzzled look on his face and his left hand clenching at his side.

“Ah, John,” Sherlock says. "Tea?”

John stares at him, his mouth half open, confusion and distress warring themselves out over his face. For a moment Sherlock thinks he will say something, a word, a confession, some indication that maybe things aren't as alright as Sherlock had supposed. But after a moment John just shakes his head, a quick smile pushing its way up to his lips.

“Yeah,” he says, “That's great. Ta.”

 


	2. Two

The second time it happens, Sherlock is at home. It is 4:23 am and he is lying on the sofa with his back to the room. He has dozed off at some point because it wakes him, the uneven thudding on the ceiling above his head. He listens to it for a minute, trying to decipher by the sound and the frequency what it is exactly that John is throwing, before it hits him that it's 4:24 am and John shouldn't be awake to throw anything.

He hesitates, not ready to commit himself to climbing those stairs yet.

John has been quiet lately. _Quieter,_ perhaps he should say. Sherlock has been watching. Since that first time. In careful sidelong glances, the way John stands in the kitchen and stirs the tea long after the sugar in Sherlock's cup has dissolved and the milk is distributed, the funnels circling the rim of the cup and spilling over.. The way he doesn't even pretend to watch the telly anymore, lying on his back on the sofa with the sound on mute, the lights flickering till he hasn't even realised the room's gotten dark and it's time for bed. The way he sleeps more but doesn't seem rested, coming down in the mornings with eyes bruised and dull, the skin sagging off his cheeks and making him look years older. Sherlock has taken to checking on him in the middle of the night, standing in the open door of his room, staring at the way his chest heaves in the crack of light from the hall, the way his eyes move under his lids and his hands clench silently at his sides.

Sherlock wishes he knows what is happening, how he can fix it. But John is silent. Never having been overly vociferous, there are times now when he doesn't talk for days, offering teacups with quiet smiles that don't quite reach far enough to disturb the dark circles under his eyes. He doesn't go to work, which is fine. Sherlock has never thought the idea of John having a second job a good one. It cut too much into the time that Sherlock might need him and it was far too difficult to get a hold of him since John tended to turn his phone off and the nurses never buzzed Sherlock through if John was in with a patient.

But Sherlock is now torn between wanting to cling to John with wholehearted ferocity and wanting to look away, to have a single second free to pretend that everything is fine, that Mary never happened, that Jim Moriarty didn't exist, that he hadn't been so spectacularly _wrong_ about everything.

But he knows it's not that easy. That this is his penance. That part of this is his fault. Not all of it, obviously, but some of it, and every time he looks at John he remembers how large a part of him had revelled in the challenge that Moriarty had presented, that even at the darkest point, standing on the edge of that roof and looking down at John—a heart pounding figure on the pavement below—some part of him had thrilled at the _cleverness_ of it, the _not boring_ ness. And he hates himself. _He hates himself._ Because he should have known. He should have done better. He remembers laughing, looking at John again for the first time in two years and four months, _two years and four months of utter hell,_ that had nothing to do with challenges and cleverness and thrills, just utter hell in which he ached every day because even then he had begun to realise that he'd been wrong, that this should have gone another way, that he should have _just tried harder._ And he remembers the rage on John's face, the exact opposite of everything he had hoped to see, that he had genuinely thought he would see. He remembers the sudden mental backpedalling as he tried to figure out at what point exactly he had bungled this up so completely and the moment, far too late, when he realised that this wasn't something that could be fixed with a joke, a casual laugh, because at some point _somewhere_ they had slipped past that.

It drives him mad, not knowing where that point was.

The sound from upstairs is now changing. The individual thuds of small objects have been replaced by the sudden long scrape of something heavy being dragged across the floor and Sherlock sits bolt upright. It is a compulsion because he isn't sure that he actually wants to be proved right, because he knows what sits in that corner of John's room. But when he realises where it's being dragged to he is off the sofa and halfway up the stairs before he is fully aware that's he moved. And this is different, because he's not used to action before reason, but there is something clamouring in his brain, an alarm bell going off, and when he reaches the door at the top of the stairs he doesn't even pause. He grabs the handle and pushes through and is just in time to slip in through the crack before he finds himself being pushed away and he is sprawling on the wooden floor as the door is slammed shut and the enormous old wardrobe is shoved in front of it, John straining behind it to work it into place.

Sherlock freezes, stays utterly still. John is panting, his chest heaving and his shoulders rising and falling with every breath. There is only the light from the street coming in through the small window but it is enough for Sherlock to see the impassive face, the eyes half-lidded, and it's more than enough to see the heavy shape of the gun held in John's left hand.

He is fighting the impetus to move with everything that is in him. His only instinct is to snatch the gun away, shake John awake, because while he's aware that this is fascinating, that it is unlikely he will ever have the chance to observe this drastic an example of somnambulism again, the fact that this is John overrides everything else. He wishes he could have back that detached curiosity because this feeling, this feeling like something trying to pry its way out from behind his rib cage, the overwhelming urge to _scream_ and not being able to, it is too close to physical pain. He can feel it trickling out of him, simply too much to contain, and he wonders that the force of that alone—streaming from his eyes, his ears, his fingertips, from every pore of his body—isn't enough to wake John where he stands.

He doesn't dare move. Isn't sure that he can. He can't stop watching John who has slumped against the back of the wardrobe now, his gun held in a loose but competent grip. The angle of his head suggests that he is listening for something and Sherlock does his best to quiet his breathing. Still himself completely.

He begins to count in his head because he feels it might be important. It was 4:23 when he first heard the sounds of objects being tossed onto the floor and he can see the mess out of the corner of his eye, the entire contents of the heavy old wardrobe thrown frantically onto the floor. He sees clothes, a photo album, two boxes sealed with tape, several pairs of shoes, and just like that Sherlock realises that John hasn't left the flat except to go to the shop a few blocks away and that these things have been here all along, that John never took them with him. He is almost angry at himself because he should have looked, should have come up here, except that he couldn't, he couldn't face it. This empty room with its echoes of accusations that Sherlock had no answers for.

But he can't think of that now because the number in his head has reached seven minutes and forty-six seconds and he can see the gradual slackening of John's shoulders, the way his head begins to tip forward and his grip loosen on the hard black metal of the gun.

Slowly, like a something too large toppling from too great a height, John begins to fall, and Sherlock is already there, a single smooth movement that has the gun out of his hand even as he hits the ground and sighs. Sherlock is breathing hard even as John's own breath calms, slips back down to normal range, and he watches as John curls up slightly, his knees pressing towards his chest and a small whimper coming out from between parted lips.

Sherlock has no idea how much time he has, how he's going to do this. He looks at the room around him, at the wardrobe against the door and John sleeping peacefully now in front of it.

Carefully, _so so carefully,_ he crouches beside John and it is almost a caress, almost instinctual. He doesn't know how to touch other people but his body seems to at least understand how to touch John because he is slowly sliding his arms under his shoulders and John is slowly rising towards him. His eyes are closed and he is clearly asleep but part of him is aware and moving because he is rising to his feet with Sherlock and letting himself be walked to his bed where he slowly folds inwards, dragging the blankets to his chest and holding them there and he gives a huff and goes still.

Sherlock stands there, staring at him, not quite able to believe that this is happening, that John is actually asleep, and it's as he watches him that he sees John's lips open and the edges of a word slip from his sleeping tongue.

“Sherlock.”

“John.” He doesn't even realise he's said it until it's out of his mouth and hanging in the air between them, an audible presence far too loud and abrupt. But John's eyes don't open, just his lips curving into a smile that Sherlock hasn't seen for...for...how long? Since that day in November, after the incident with the bomb in the train car and he had come out of his room to see John standing there with a look on his face like he had seen something wonderful, something beautiful, but it wasn't. It was only Sherlock, and in spite of himself Sherlock had felt himself smiling back.

“Stay,” John sighs and Sherlock's heart gives two deliberate beats and for a moment he is sure they are the last two beats his heart will ever give.

But then John sighs again, his face buried halfway into his pillow, and Sherlock watches his breath even out, his hands relax against the blankets, and when he's sure John is fully sleeping and that he himself is not in fact about to have a heart attack, he turns determinedly to the wardrobe against the door.

Sherlock is careful, tipping it slowly across the room an inch at a time. He makes almost no noise but it takes him at least ten minutes to get it back into its original position in the far corner and he is sweating and panting by the end of it. He has no idea what the original arrangement of the belongings scattered across the floor was, and it makes him anxious, thinking that there could be any clue at all that John might pick up on, any moment of doubt or uncertainty when he opens these doors tomorrow. But it can't be helped, and quickly and efficiently he puts everything back into its logical place. He pauses only briefly at the boxes, shaking them gently, trying to gauge their contents. But he has no time and reluctantly he places them far back in the right corner, then closes the doors quietly, and with a last lingering look at John, entirely at ease in his bed, Sherlock leaves the room.

Four hours later, Sherlock stands in the kitchen pouring milk into two coffee cups when John shuffles in, still in his sleep trousers and t-shirt, his dressing gown loose around him.

“Morning,” he says.

“Good morning,” Sherlock says. “Coffee?”

“Ta,” John says with a smile and doesn't look Sherlock in the eye.

 


	3. Three

It is two days before his muscles stop hurting from the wardrobe incident and two weeks before he stops playing that word over in his head, the single mumbled syllable: _Stay._

He lays on the sofa, John ten feet away in his chair, staring at a book he isn't reading. It isn't one of the ones that Sherlock had snatched from Mary's flat a month ago, the day John had come back to him. Those remain in the duffel by the doorway, the whole thing untouched. Apart from the toiletries that John had removed on that first day, nothing else has been claimed, and Sherlock notices how John avoids looking at it, his gaze sliding over it as if it's some mistake that he can't erase and so is trying to simply ignore it instead. The clothes he does wear are old, worn, but Sherlock remembers them perfectly. He assumes they have remained here along with the boxes and the photo album and something in him chokes, because he can't imagine John moving out, packing a handful of items, leaving everything that matters behind. But it seems that that's exactly that he did.

Sherlock wants to get rid of it, the duffel and everything in it, but he's not sure if he should. He had gone to get it. Packed it with his own hands. Brought it back. But John has claimed it. It no longer lies within the bounds of Things That Sherlock Can Touch, and while this might not have bothered him once, now he is left staring at it every time he sits in his chair, stepping over it every time he walks in from the hall, and he is trying to come up with the moment that everything between them had changed.

Sherlock has his fingers steepled at his lips and he knows that John thinks he is in his Mind Palace. But he's not. He's watching John not read and thinking about that bloody duffel and the way John's voice had sighed over that syllable. He can recreate it perfectly, but he's afraid he will lose it soon, the singular cadence of that half-conscious murmur,  _the smile,_ his face wide open for the first time in three hundred and sixty-three days, something light behind it that Sherlock hasn't seen switched on for almost a year. He wants to hear it again. He wants to start a whole collection of words. Wants to record them somewhere so that when the exact nuances begin to fade around the edges he will be able to play them back, the exact same way he heard them the first time, and remember each and every one all over again.

So intent is he on the memory of that syllable that he doesn't immediately notice when John stands up, reaching over his head in a broad stretch that has his shirt tugging at the waist of his trousers. Sherlock stares, wondering if it will give way.

“Going to get takeaway. Any requests?”

Sherlock blinks, shrugs. “Call them.”

“Need to walk a bit. Thai okay?”

Sherlock frowns. The Thai place is almost ten blocks away.

“Chinese,” he says.  _Merely three._

John nods. “Righto. Back in a tick.”

He grabs his jacket and slips his wallet and his phone in his pocket and Sherlock watches as he hesitates at the door, a swift glance up the stairs and a guilty one at him.

Sherlock pretends not to notice, shutting his lids and listening to the slow tap as John goes up to his room. He has a suspicion but he doesn't say anything, not even when he hears the uncertain hesitation as John passes by the sitting room door again, before his steps speed up and he practically flees the house.

As soon as Sherlock hears the door shut behind him he is off the sofa and bounding up the stairs. He knows where to look. He knows exactly where to look. The floorboard pried off of its nails under John's bed on the side farthest from the door. Sherlock raises it using his nails, cursing as he feels a splinter lodge painfully underneath his left index one, and peering inside the small, neatly lined space, he sees exactly what he expects.

He is back on the sofa when John returns twenty minutes later, clutching a paper bag with the familiar logo on it, and for a moment it all feels so familiar, so natural, that Sherlock is left unbalanced.

He sits up, staring at the bulge at the back of John's waistline and John, something almost bright on his face, sees that glance and immediately everything shuts down again.

“Expecting trouble?” Sherlock asks.

“Can't be too careful. Not after everything that—after everything.” He sets the bag on the edge of the coffee table, staring down at it, unable to look Sherlock in the eye as he reaches behind him and pulls the gun out from the small of his back. They both stare at it for a moment, heavy and dark in the pale palms of his hands.

“You knew I was going to take it,” John says.

Sherlock shrugs. “I suspected,” he said carefully. “Probably a good idea, all things considered.”

John's brow furrows and he looks up at Sherlock for the first time. “What are we doing, Sherlock?”

And Sherlock doesn't know how to answer that because he doesn't know exactly what John means.

So Sherlock offers a smile, small and quizzical. “Eating,” he says. “Hungry?”

For a moment it looks like John is going to say something else. He stares at Sherlock and Sherlock is aware of the pressure, of the questions that need to be asked, the dozen things that need to be discussed, but he doesn't want to, not right now. There is Chinese food on the table between them and John is in clothing that he hasn't worn for one thousand two hundred and thirty-eight days, clothing that Mary has never seen, that she never even knew about, and Sherlock can still picture the lightness on John's face and the single word murmured into his pillow:  _Stay._

And something seems to come across, because suddenly John's face opens up and a smile appears, clinging to the corners of his eyes. “Starving,” he says.

 


	4. Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so tired and none of this makes sense to me. *posts is anyway*

Sherlock is curled on the sofa, trying to tuck his legs to his chest and failing. _He_ is failing, the world has reduced itself to the narrow borders of his body and he is hyper aware of it, of that aching, pressing agony at his centre. He clutches at his abdomen and he can feel how distended it is, something pressing from the inside, too much pressure. He moans. It is _too much._ He can almost hear his brain slowing down, the gears clicking down into silence. This is John's fault. Sherlock knows it is and he wonders if he would be annoyed if he were still capable of feeling anything, but all he can think of is the pain, of something trying to break out from behind the borders of his flesh and he doesn't know if he can stop it.

_“John,”_ he groans, and he knows he sounds pathetic, that he sounds like he is dying, but he doesn't care. He  _is_ dying. And this is all John's fault.

John is on the other end of the sofa, slouched against the backrest, legs sprawled out, head thrown back and eyes closed. His face is utterly unresponsive.

“John!” Sherlock groans again, louder this time, and he sees the flicker of an eye as the lids open and John rolls his head to look at him.

“I told you not to eat so much,” John says.

Sherlock whimpers. “I'm so  _full.”_

“You just had to have that last dumpling.”

“It was so good.”

“I told you you would regret it.”

“I think I'm dying, John.”

“I told you you would blame me.”

“This is all your fault.”

John sighs but Sherlock can see the way he's trying not to smile, the way the muscles at the corners of his eyes are trying not to contract. But Sherlock knows that expression and he glares because John's not taking this seriously.

“This is horrible,” he whispers.

“You did this. This is what happens when you don't eat for fifty hours and your body suddenly remembers what food is for.”

“It hurts.”

John sighs and the first crack of the smile splits the corner of his mouth. “Idiot,” he says, and it is laden with the same sentiment as  _stay_ and for a brief heartbeat Sherlock forgets his belly and the sharp lancing precursor of the cramps.

“John,” he says, and he doesn't know what's in his voice because John's eye flickering towards him is suddenly shy and Sherlock is very aware of the hand John has on the sofa at his side, inches away from where Sherlock's foot is sunk between two cushions.

“Sherlock—”

And just like that the questions are back, the awareness of everything unfinished that still lies between them. Mary, the baby, the domestic. Y _ou chose her_ and  _why is everything always my fault._ It's not John's fault though. It's not. And Sherlock can still feel the fissure that speaking those words had caused to crack open. He had wanted to explain but nothing had been sure. Nothing could be certain. And now...now those things are still there and Sherlock wishes he could make them just  _go away,_ throw them remorselessly into that hollow pit that is gaping in the empty inches that separate Sherlock's foot from John's hand—if not destroyed than at least forever hidden. But he knows he can't do that. That John deserves an answer. That John deserves better than what he has ended up with despite Sherlock's best efforts.

But now, full from Chinese food, John in the clothes that Mary has never seen, Sherlock wants nothing more than to see that smile again, to see the sudden switch of that light that only Sherlock ever gets to see. That light is his and he can't bear to see it going out, not now, with mere inches between them.

So Sherlock groans again, deliberately stretching his legs out and he feels the press of heat from John's thigh, then the empty space between his thighs and Sherlock let's his feet rest fully on John's lap.

There is a silence and John has frozen beneath him.

Sherlock waits, pretends not to notice, because he knows this will work, he knows exactly how many times John has looked at him with a face full of worship, how many times the naked lust has been startled out of hiding and pushed back down again. He knows John, knows that whatever he loves is a version of Sherlock that will never exist, but he is willing to try. He is willing to pretend if it means that for now at least John will stop talking, that those questions are not asked and Sherlock doesn't have to see the switch from light to dark at the mention of Mary's name.

Things have been going  _so well. Just let them stay like that._

Sherlock feels the moment John unfreezes, the moment he begins to relax, muscle by muscle, a slow erosion.

Sherlock almost feels the moment before John touches him, a too warm hand pressed against the sole of his foot and slowly, as if it is some wild animal that he is afraid to startle, John closes his hand and Sherlock feels every inch of it, the hard edge of calluses and the curve of joints, the line of each finger hot, far too hot. John is burning and Sherlock wonders if he is aware of it.

“John,” he says, and there is everything uncertain, everything accepting, and yet at the syllable of his name John is suddenly on his feet, throwing Sherlock off of him and he is already at the door to the hall before Sherlock has a chance to turn over.

“John?”

“I'll clean up tomorrow, yeah? Just...tired. Sorry your stomach—drink peppermint. I think we have some. Night, then.”

And he is gone, his footsteps an uneven staccato on the steps to his room, and Sherlock counts them, all the way to fifteen before there is the slam of the door and he hears the faint sounds of John moving above him.

He listens, hears two complete rounds of pacing before there is an abrupt pause and Sherlock can almost hear John thinking as he remembers that Sherlock can hear him. 

There is no more pacing and after a few more aborted movements there is nothing, and Sherlock realises that John has probably gotten into bed.

He stares at the mess on the table, the few leftovers and the rubbish smeared with sauces and bits of rice and he doesn't understand why it makes him feel so sad.

He knows what John wants. He would have given it to him entirely.

Sherlock doesn't want to stay here. The sofa is suddenly tainted, some repository of bad memories and he rises sharply. He walks around the coffee table and spots the duffel bag by the door and he knows this has to end. He knows the time is coming and something will need to be done and he  _needs_ John. Not only for the plan he has brewing in his head, its scattered ends not yet entirely connected, but because he  _needs him._ Just that. And it was frightening once, months ago when he had first realised it, but now it is simply a fact that he lives with. He needs John. And he can be whatever John needs in turn.

He deliberately turns away from the duffel bag and walks past it and through the kitchen to his bedroom, where his bed is abruptly the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. He strips himself carelessly, leaving his clothes on the floor where they fall, and when he is down to his pants he falls into the blankets and closes his eyes. 

He falls asleep, thinking of the light failing behind John's blue eyes.

 


	5. Five

He dreams of Poland, running through the trees, darkness on all sides but far away the skittering beams of flashlights, the deep disturbance of helicopters in the air. They are distant still but they are gaining. He hears the high yips of the dogs, the faint carrying strain of men shouting. He is running, he is running, though he knows that they will catch him soon. But not yet, not yet. There are still things he needs to do. John. _Where is John?_

There are trees all around him but no ground cover, nowhere to hide, not reliably. He will be caught. He knows he will. They have heat sensors and motion detectors and tracking dogs. It is only a matter of time.

But John is nearby. John is somewhere nearby and he needs to find him, needs to save him. He's running out of time. John is running out of time. There is someone nearby, someone too close. He hears them moving but doesn't know from where and he's afraid so he runs faster because he still needs to find John. Still needs to save John. John. Where is John? He knows this. He knows where John is, but somehow he can't think of it right now, he can't picture it in his head and he is afraid that he is running aimlessly now, going in the wrong direction. Perhaps John is already caught, perhaps it's too late.

And then it is too late. He is aware of the noise only a heartbeat before a sudden shape appears in the periphery of his vision and there is a weight on him and he feels himself crashing to the ground, a body bearing him down and he is awake and struggling and Poland is gone, the trees vanished, he is in his bed and there is someone on top of him with a hand clutched tightly around his mouth.

“Shut up, they'll hear.”

_John._

Sherlock's heart is going too fast. He can feel the flutter of his pulse against his neck and he almost can't hear above the sound of it in his own ears. He is panting, breathing too hard, too quickly, but he can't draw enough breath because John is clasping his mouth shut and there is too much weight on his chest, pressing down and collapsing. He can feel his nostrils furiously dilate, trying to suck as much oxygen in as possible, but he is becoming frantic already, the panic beginning to set in.

He has no idea if John is awake or not. The thought occurs that perhaps someone has broken in but there's no point where John, awake and rational, would fail to recognise the signs of Sherlock suffocating beneath him. He needs oxygen but he is afraid of what will happen if he struggles, if John's dream abruptly switches him from friend to enemy. If he is even capable of throwing John off when he is like this, in soldier mode, every muscle intent on its purpose.

His head is starting to pound and he sees the bright points of light starting to burst behind his eyes as the brain begins its slow death. This is not the first time he's been strangled, but it's the most perplexing because this is the first time that he can't even try to fight back.

So instead, he goes limp, every muscle instantly slack, and remembering John's words, almost blended into his dream— _Shut up, they'll hear—_ he gives a small nod of assurance, a tiny thing really, but it's enough, because almost instantly John's hand disappears and the weight on him shifts and Sherlock is dragging in breath, his whole body heaving in its effort to pull enough oxygen into his depleted lungs.

When he becomes aware again, John has settled beside him, his body tightly lined up next to Sherlock's, and he is muttering to himself, indecipherable words that Sherlock strains to hear, but it's a minute before his ears clear up enough to be able to pick them out, and when he does he almost blanks out again.

John is whispering his name. Over and over and over again.

_“Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock...”_

Just a constant loop and Sherlock doesn't understand, doesn't know why this is significant, but he knows that it is.

“What about Sherlock?” he asks, and he keeps his voice low, even, and he sees John turn a blank face towards him and it's almost eerie, those lips moving in their endless cycle, no expression on his unconscious face.

“Have to find him,” John says. “He's close. I can smell him already. I know what he smells like. It's him. They have him. I have to find him.”

And it's almost funny, Sherlock actually wants to laugh, because what are the chances that he and John are having almost the same dream on the same night, only their roles reversed, each trying to save the other.

“Who has him?” he asks, and he knows it's risky but he doesn't care. Wants to know. But John is suddenly starting to fade away. Sherlock can feel the slackening in the tense line of the body pressed against his own as John dips towards him, his head falling sideways to settle halfway onto Sherlock's arm, the coil of his arm settling across Sherlock's ribs.

“Sherlock,” John says, and his voice is no longer the clear cut precision of his previous assertions, but a sigh, breathed out between parted lips. “Found you.”

Sherlock is almost afraid to move. Afraid to disturb him. Afraid to wake him up, have him sit up and realise where he is and leave. John is warm and he smells like cheap shampoo and sweat and fabric softener. He doesn't want John to leave. But he also knows that if John wakes up like this, draped halfway over Sherlock in Sherlock's bed, he will know that something has been happening. He already suspects. What will happen if John finds out what he does in his sleep? Will he move out? Will he find a place on his own, worried about disturbing Sherlock? About hurting him?

He needs to do something. He needs to take John back to his own bed, walk him slowly up those stairs, settle him down and leave him there, because John can never know that this has happened.

But he's so warm, so comfortable. Sherlock knows his smell. It is home, it is comfort, it is everything to him. It is the smell that would jerk him awake at random times while he trawled the backwaters of Eastern Europe for two years and four months, a faint remembered aroma that had no basis in reality but would still startle him out of sleep without the faintest possibility of a hope. His body is attuned to that smell, of home, of here, of John.

And now, lying in bed, it is not the false memory of his own desperate imaginings, but actually John, clinging to him and breathing hot and humid against his chest, and Sherlock doesn't want to let it go quite yet. In a minute. Maybe two. Two minutes won't make a difference.

But he falls asleep after one.

 


	6. Six

It is the light that wakes him, the morning sliding surreptitiously in through the crack in the curtains and settling squarely on Sherlock's face.

He frowns, grunts, turns his head. He is hot. Too hot. Why's it so hot in here?

There is something on top of him, heavier than his blankets, and he traces the feeling of limbs that aren't his own. An arm, a leg, a head. Fingers spread out and softly curled on the bare skin of his chest. Hair against his chin that isn't his own. But it's good. It's nice. Everything is permeated with the smell of fabric softener and the generic brand shampoo that John likes to use and the faint smell of sweat, both his own and John's, because it is too hot in this room, far too hot. Too many blankets. Or maybe they should sleep with the window cracked. Two grown men produce a great deal of heat in the night.

And maybe it is the heat, or the lulling sense of security that has wrapped itself around him and made it difficult to think too clearly, but it's not until then, at least three minutes since he first opened his eyes against the intrusion of the morning light, that Sherlock realises what is wrong.

His eyes snap open.

John.

_John._

As if on cue, there is a quiet groan from beside him and the hot body clinging to his begins to tense, muscles flexing and stretching after a night spent immobile.

Sherlock is frozen, is terrified but oddly thrilled because suddenly it is unavoidable. What this is. Whatever they have. Neither one of them can walk away from this anymore.

John exhales, a long loud breath that is almost half yawn and the flexing muscles slowly relax again, fingers stretching to spread out against Sherlock's naked chest.

“Hmm,” John sighs, his head nuzzling further into the shoulder it's settled on, the hairs on the top of his head tickling at Sherlock's nose and Sherlock wants to bury himself in it, put his face right against the soft strands and inhale them. But he doesn't, because he is too afraid to move.

“Sherlock?” John says, and there is something so soft about his voice, so dreamy, so certain. But it is happy, an underlying contentedness that Sherlock has never heard in John's voice before and it's enough to make him look down at the warm body against him.

It is such a terrible idea. John's eyes are closed and his face, his face...the light is on and blazing and Sherlock has no idea how he's going to do this, how he's going to keep that light from flickering back off again.

And even as he begins to feel the crack begin to widen behind his rib cage, the unavoidable realisation that eventually he's going to fail, that there is no way he can maintain this lie, this perfect sleeping thing that John seems to want, these moments before the day creeps in and the sulks happen and the experiments and the body parts and the accusations and the disappointments, the creases appear in John's brow and the fingers against his chest suddenly clench until it is a fist and the frown is starting to drag at the thin line of his lips.

“Sherlock?” John says again, but the light is gone, the contentedness has disappeared. Sherlock watches blue eyes flicker open and he feels the brush of eyelashes against his chest.

For the briefest of instants their eyes meet, a single silent heartbeat. Then John is flushing and pushing himself away, his face red and his eyes wide and shocked.

“Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Oh my God, I am so sorry, I am so sorry. Jesus Christ, Sherlock, I swear I don't know—I didn't—I—”

He is clambering desperately out of the bed, fighting the catch of the blankets, the way his sleep trousers are too loose and drag against his hips, pooling around his feet and making him clumsy, the old t-shirt he is wearing rucked up and twisted on his shoulders, flashing bare belly and back, the hint of the hollow space at the base of his spine. Sherlock sees the white lines of old scars and wants to touch them, wants to trace and memorise each one, but it's too late. John is gone.

“John—”

“Sherlock, I swear I don't know—I didn't mean—I have no idea how—”

“John, it's fine.”

“Yeah. Yeah. Fine. Okay. Sorry. I'm just.” He is gone so fast, stumbling out of the room, his face pointed downwards, the curve of his spine round and tense and defensive. Sherlock doesn't know what to think. What to do. Should he go after him? Leave him alone? Go and make tea and pretend it never happened? He remembers last night and it feels like a dream.

He gets up slowly, disentangling himself from sheets that suddenly seem far too complicated. They drag at him and he feels like he's being swallowed whole. He needs to get out, he needs to escape because it's  _too hot_ and the air in here is stifling.

When he manages it, he almost flees the room immediately, but he remembers at the last moment that he is wearing only his pants and once perhaps this wouldn't have bothered him, would have amused him to watch the desperate want rising up and being shut down on John's face, his eyes dilating at the expanse of presented skin. But today he understands that those things belong somewhere else, before that point which he still hasn't managed to identify, that moment when everything had changed.

He gets dressed quickly and efficiently, changing his pants and pulling on fresh trousers and a shirt, crisp and unlined from his wardrobe. He puts on socks and shoes and pulls on a jacket and wants to put his coat on as well except that it's in the sitting room. He passes through the bathroom without turning on the light, pausing only to relieve him himself and run a shaking hand through his hair. With a deep breath he turns to the hallway and with quick determined strides walks into the kitchen.

John is nowhere to be seen. Not in the kitchen, not in the sitting room. The floorboards above Sherlock's head are silent, no sound of water running from the upstairs toilet with its small sink and smaller shower. Sherlock wonders if he's left but his shoes are still sitting by the sofa where he kicked them off last night and his jacket is slung over the stack of boxes by the door.

He considers going upstairs, but stops himself at the last minute, his foot already on the first tread. Turning back to the sitting room he finds his phone on the coffee table where he left it last night among the detritus of their final meal, and he unlocks the screen, ignoring the five new text messages and the three emails. He opens a new text and enters John's name then stares at it for a full thirty seconds, no idea what to say.

But in the end there are only so many choices, only so many things one  _can_ say:

 

> _Tea? -SH_

 

It feels like an eternity before the alert pops up and he is listening the whole time, every sense straining for some noise from upstairs, but there is nothing but silence so Sherlock knows that John has been sitting on his bed and staring at the message on his phone in silence for three full minutes before typing in the two letter response:

 

> _Ta._

 

He practically runs to the kitchen, running the water into the kettle, pulling out cups and sugar and milk and tea. The water is taking ages. He stares at the kettle fiercely, willing it to boil faster.

He has only just poured the milk into the two cups when he hears the first sound on the steps and he feels his entire body flush, a wave of heat rising up and he knows he is completely red.

He hears the footsteps reach the first floor landing and then a pause, and then John enters through the sitting room and Sherlock doesn't know what to make of that, what that means. Surely John saw him through the door? Standing at the kitchen table stirring tea?

There is another silence, longer, and Sherlock is straining, trying to hear, trying to pick up and decipher every shuffle and swish of fabric, every pressure of foot against a familiar floorboard. He wants to turn around, to look, but he is afraid because he doesn't know what he wants to see.

He is instantly aware of John coming into the kitchen, of that presence at his back, so familiar, so known. He would know John anywhere in world. Slowly he forces himself to turn around, a mug in each hand, and he holds one out automatically, without even looking up, but eventually his eyes have to follow, have to look, and when he does he can feel his heart stutter in his chest.

John is standing in the opening of the sitting room, a look on his face that Sherlock has never seen before, but he's afraid of it, so afraid. But almost worse than the look on John's face is the duffel bag, slung over John's shoulder.

 


	7. Seven

“John?”

He says it. He knows he says it. But his lips and his tongue feel numb and clumsy and he's not sure if the sound comes out the way it's supposed to. He needs to know what this means. He knows what this looks like but he could be wrong. This could be something else. He knows he misses things sometimes, gets mixed up. Sentiment. Emotion. He understands but he doesn't understand. He stares at the bag on John's shoulder and the look on John's face and he is so afraid.

“Sherlock. God. Sherlock.” John's voice is broken, as broken as his expression, staring at Sherlock from the edge of two rooms, neither here nor there. “I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.”

“John. What—”

“How many times? How many times have I done this to you? Are there other marks? Have you been hiding them? Jesus, Sherlock.”

Sherlock's brow is furrowed. He's confused. But John is staring at his face without really looking at him and it takes him a minute but Sherlock finally begins to understand. Without a word, he turns around and walks into the bathroom and turns on the light and for the first time stares at his reflection in the mirror.

Covering the lower half of his face there are deep bruises and he can pick out the outline of each finger, the small half circles that indicate the edges of nails where they bit into his skin. There is movement in the mirror behind him and John appears and there is guilt and heartbreak on his face and Sherlock recognises these things because he knows them so well.

“Sherlock. Jesus. I swear, I swear I didn't realise. I didn't—Jesus, Sherlock. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.”

Sherlock is shaking his head, a compulsive movement he is barely aware of and can't control.

“No. No, John. Somnambulism. Low level consciousness, no memory. It's not—it's stress. It can be inherited. John, this is not your fault.”

“Jesus, Sherlock, yes. Yes. It is. It's my fault. I can't believe—This morning. Waking up. God, I thought I was dreaming. I thought—I thought—” he stops and gives a bark of laughter that is utterly devoid of anything resembling amusement. “I didn't want to wake up. I would've slept forever. I smelled you. That ridiculous shampoo you buy. Bloody Chinese food. I thought I was dreaming. Jesus. I wish I had been.”

“I'm fine. John. I swear, I'm fine. It barely even hurts.”

“I could've killed you.” Another bark of that horrible laughter and Sherlock hates that sound, hates it coming from John. “It certainly looks like I tried. Jesus. What was it? Did I think you were Moriarty? Some insurgent? Mary? Mycroft? Tell me. Jesus Christ, tell me something.”

“It was—I don't know. You were trying to save me, though. John, I swear, you were trying to save me.”

“Yeah. Doing a good job of that, was I?”

“It wasn't like that. John, John, I'm fine. It's nothing. I don't even feel—”

“How many, Sherlock?”

“W-what?”

“How many times? How many times have I done this?”

“There—what? I—I don't know.”

“Yeah. You do. You know everything. Of course you know. Fuck. Tell me. Sherlock, tell me or I swear to God—”

“Three. Just three. And you didn't hurt me those other times. You didn't touch me.”

John is staring at him, his breath coming in quick, his nostrils flaring with every breath, his head low and dangerous and Sherlock has seen that look before, levelled at Mary, at Moriarty, at Mycroft, at Magnussen. But never at him. Never at Sherlock.

“John. I'm sorry. I didn't—”

“That morning. I woke up in the sitting room. You knew. You saw me. That's why you made so much noise coming upstairs. The tea. Jesus Christ.”

“I thought—”

“And two weeks ago. You were in my room. I swear you were in my room. And my gun was moved. I had it on my bedside table and when I woke up it was back under the floorboard and everything in the wardrobe had been rearranged. What happened that night? What did I do? Did I try to shoot you? Did I hold a gun to you, Sherlock?”

John is angry. He is so angry. But he is shaking and it is at utter variance with how John normally acts when he is angry. He is always so still, so quiet. Only his breath, the dilation of his nostrils, then the quick compact movement as action is required and taken without an intervening thought between. John. His John. He is shaking now and Sherlock doesn't understand it, this sudden break in the pattern, going against everything Sherlock knows about him.

“You didn't—You were protecting me. There were people. I mean you dreamt people. They were coming for us. You were protecting me. Last night, too, John I swear, I swear you were protecting me. I wasn't afraid. I was never afraid.”

John stares at him and Sherlock stares back, breathing fast, his heart loud and frantic in his ears because the duffel bag is still there, still slung awkwardly over John's shoulder, dragging him down. And slowly, slowly the anger starts to dissipate, sliding slowly away and leaving something else in its wake: grief?

“Sherlock. I'm not as clever as you are, but I have at least learnt to tell when you're lying to me.”

Sherlock stares at him, can't speak, can't say anything, because John is turning away, turning away and he is leaving, _he is leaving,_ and Sherlock is left in the bathroom, the doorway in front of him suddenly empty.

 


	8. Eight

Sherlock has no idea what's just happened.

He stares at where John used to be, seconds before, mere seconds. He can still smell him, for God's sake. He can still hear him, steady feet tapping against the wooden floor of the hallway, reaching the battered linoleum of the kitchen. John is going. He's going. And he's taking that bag, that horrible bag with him. Where is he going? Is he even going to tell Sherlock? Is this it? Is this John saying goodbye? Is this some kind of punishment? A test? He is taking that bag, the bag that for four weeks he wouldn't touch because it didn't belong here, belonged somewhere else, to someone else. It had nothing to do with them and yet John is taking it and he is leaving everything else behind, just like last time, just like when Sherlock had died.

Except he hadn't died. He hadn't. He was alive and he's alive now and yet John...John is walking away and Sherlock hates that bag, hates everything about it, hates that he had to stare at it for four weeks without knowing why and that now that it's finally gone it's going to take everything else away with it. He hates that bag. He hates it.

He is moving without having thought about it first. It feels like ages, like hours, like days have passed since John has turned around and walked away but it has been seconds, barely even seconds. He isn't even through the kitchen yet by the time Sherlock catches up to him, and John hears, hears the rapid sound of Sherlock's steps behind him but he isn't expecting what happens next, isn't expecting the hand on the strap of the duffel, the violent tug as the bag is dislodged and John himself gives a cry and stumbles, almost falling before catching himself against the kitchen table. But he is too late to do anything because Sherlock has the bag now, that fucking duffel bag and every item of clothing, every page of those books that don't belong here, and he is moving towards the window and by the time John realises what he's going to do it's too late. Sherlock pushes the window open and he doesn't even look to make sure the sidewalk is clear before he throws the bag outside. He doesn't even watch the course of its flight, doesn't care, because it's gone, it's gone, he never has to look at it again. He slams the window shut and turns around to find John halfway across the sitting room with a look of disbelief on his face.

“Did you just throw my bloody bag out the window?”

“Surely even you aren't that blind, John.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, you're insane. Do you know how easily you could have hurt someone? Did you even look? Did you even check to make sure there was no one underneath? No, of course you didn't, because it doesn't matter to you, nothing matters to you. None of us matter. You just think you can do whatever you like and it won't make a fucking difference because nothing will touch you, nothing has consequences. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck! No. Fuck. Sherlock. No. I'm sorry. I didn't mean that. I didn't mean that. Sherlock. Jesus. I can't. I can't. Jesus Christ I need to go. I need to leave. I'm sorry, Sherlock. Jesus Christ, I have to go.”

His voice is breaking, high and tense and cracking at every edge and Sherlock doesn't understand, doesn't know how much he believes, how much John believes. Because he cares. Sherlock cares. Not about the idiots walking by on the street but about John. Yes, about John, always John, John is everything. And Sherlock is standing with his back to the window and watching as John spins on his heels, his arms tense and ready at his side, his gait stiff and stilted, too much fight running through him, nowhere for it to go. He knows this John. This is the John that needs to hit things, to take his gun out and shoot at things because that is what John does, that is how John copes.

But he doesn't want John to cope. He doesn't want him to _need_ to cope. Because it means he's leaving, it means he's turning his back and finding something else to focus on, something else to bear the brunt of all the spare adrenaline coursing through him with nowhere to go, but Sherlock doesn't want that. He wants to be the thing that John focuses on, the thing that he expends that energy on.

He catches him in three strides, a hard grip on John's arm and John is spinning immediately, his fist out, the intent clear on his face. It is instinct, Sherlock knows. It is a matter of defense, an ingrained reaction, beaten and trained into every flex and extension of every muscle. This has nothing to do with Sherlock, with wanting to hurt Sherlock. This has to do with someone grabbing him from behind while too many chemicals run havoc through his blood stream. But it's what John needs, it's what he wants, and Sherlock forces himself to stay still, to remain unmoving as that fist comes towards him.

But it never comes. Sherlock opens his eyes without having realised he's closed them and he sees John standing there, all tension drained from him, staring at Sherlock with eyes wide and terrified.

“You want this,” John says. “Why—what are you doing?”

“You need it. You're running high on adrenaline. This is when you need to hit things or you go to that place that Mycroft told you about to shoot at things.”

“How did you—”

“I'm not an idiot, John,” he snaps.

“Considering you were about to martyr yourself for the sake of my bad temper, yeah I'd say you were a fucking idiot.”

“If _you_ weren't such an idiotI wouldn't have to martyr myself.”

“You are a fucking madman, you know that? Fucking mad. Why. Why. Just—fucking tell me that somewhere in that enormous fucking brain of yours that line of reasoning actually made sense.”

_“You were leaving.”_

It is like something that has been falling has just hit the ground from an unfathomable height. The silence is so complete that Sherlock is sure that they've both stopped breathing.

And then suddenly, from utter stillness to a single comprehensive movement—action before thought, instinct without reason—John surges forward and Sherlock doesn't have time to react, doesn't have time to step forward or step back or do anything before John's lips are on his and John is kissing him _John is kissing him_ and he is kissing John back.

There is nothing gentle, nothing soft about it. He feels teeth and tongue and the hard line of lips that should be soft, should be nothing but warmth and safety. But they're not, they're demanding, a steady, unrelenting incursion and for a brief moment Sherlock is lost, utterly swept under. He is not aware of losing track of the world, the room around him. But he is aware of something solid behind his thighs and he surfaces for a heartbeat, barely time enough to see that it's the desk and he has no memory of having moved at all. It is cluttered and covered with the detritus of the past month, the surface almost invisible underneath the papers and the jars and the boxes, but it's not important, because John makes a sound like a snarl, something animal and guttural from deep inside his chest, and then he is kissing him again and Sherlock loses everything, loses the world, the table, because there is only John.

He is aching, incredibly aware of every inch of John pressed tightly against every inch of him. He is hot and he is hard, aware of every flex of muscle, every shift of breath. There is a noise, a snarling, growling, rumble of animal possession and Sherlock doesn't even realise it's himself that's making it until John pulls back, his blue eyes dark and bright and predatory and his teeth bared and there is blood dripping down John's chin, the puncture of teeth in John's bottom lip, and Sherlock tastes copper on his tongue.

Sherlock makes a dive for John, frustration battling restraint, but John avoids him, lurches unsteadily to the side and ends up with his face against Sherlock's chest, hands clenched in his shirt.

“Sherlock,” John moans, and he is panting, the hot damp of his breath bleeding through Sherlock's thin shirt, his voice muffled, and Sherlock shuts his eyes and tries to keep himself from prying John away from him, from pushing him back and taking those words with his tongue. “Jesus, Sherlock. You are never, never going to do that again. You are never going to stand there and let me hurt you because I swear to God I will kill you if you ever do something like that again.”

“That doesn't make sense,” Sherlock grinds out, and John laughs, a high-pitched hysterical sound.

“Shut up, Sherlock.”

“Shut up, John,” Sherlock says and pulls John's head up, his hands clumsy and rough, feels the way John gives in to him and lets it happen, and Sherlock and kisses him and the sound John makes, part whimper, part groan, sends a spike of heat rushing up Sherlock's spine.

Sherlock is aware that he's hard, that he is aching and straining and almost frantic. His hips push forward, trying to find traction against the long line of John's cock, hot and insistent against his thigh. They are both thrusting against each other, hips stuttering, their entire bodies unsteady.

Sherlock needs friction, he needs heat, he needs something. He thrusts into John, harder, trying to find it, trying to find something that will help because he is frantic with how much he _wants_ right now, how much he needs something to touch him.

And John knows. Of course John knows. He is pulling back and Sherlock can feel the heat of John's parted lips as they slide downwards, finding Sherlock's neck, his collar bone. Sherlock feels teeth, a short sharp bite and he snarls, a sound low and frustrated, torn from the back of his throat. There are hands, fingers at his trousers, dragging at buttons, tearing them apart, moving them away. John's hands are warm, feverish. Sherlock feels them through the material of his pants, pulling the grey cotton away, elastic waist band dragging down his hips and John pants against his neck and the line of heat from his body suddenly disappears and John is kneeling down in front of him.

Sherlock stares, barely able to comprehend the sight. His own cock is standing upright, almost flush against his belly, John's eyes blue and dark, so dark, staring up at him with a look both questioning and determined. "Tell me if I should stop,” he says, and Sherlock watches him lean in, the tip of John's tongue seeking, then tasting, and Sherlock's brain shuts down.

He can't think. He can't... _John. John._ His mouth, hot and wet and soft and so good so incredible _oh God oh God John John John John John._

There is something building, fast, so fast. He is utterly unable to control it, utterly unable to stop. He is thrusting, his cock pushing between John's lips and Sherlock stares down, staring at his cock vanishing into John's mouth and it is incredible, it is obscene. He is completely unable to control himself. He knows he should stop, should slow down, should let John dictate depth and speed, but he can't, he can't. He pushes deeper and deeper instead and John, _oh my God John,_ he isn't moving, simply kneeling in front of Sherlock and letting him thrust into his mouth as though this is everything, as though Sherlock is the one in control, as though there is nothing more important right now than this, than Sherlock. But there is, because John is everything. He is _everything._ There is nothing Sherlock wouldn't do.

John is humming and moaning now, his face wet with saliva, with the water from his eyes. His throat is vibrating against the head of Sherlock's cock and Sherlock is lost, staring at John, his eyes wide and his mouth open, and there is almost no warning, nothing to hold onto when suddenly Sherlock is coming, shouting John's name and gripping his head, buried to the back of his throat and John moans loudly around him.

Sherlock is panting, heaving. Unable to catch his breath. The sound of his own blood almost deafening in his ears. He can feel himself softening, everything too sensitive. John's mouth is hot around him, not moving, just holding him between his lips and Sherlock moans. Wants to sink into it, collapse and fold inwards. Everything is loose, unhinged. He sighs and it comes out as another moan and he feels John slip off of him and Sherlock claws at the shoulders under his hands and drags John up and he holds him, holds John, his arms dragging him near and pulling in the heat of his body, the wetness of his breath. It takes several seconds for him to realise that the hard line of John's cock is still straining into his thigh, that John is shifting and thrusting, minute movements made of desperation.

"Sherlock," he says. "I need—"

And Sherlock stops him, kisses him hard, sliding his tongue into John's mouth and tasting himself.

John's hands are moving between them. Sherlock can feel them, dipping below John's belt, pulling it apart, tearing down the fly and ripping at the buttons. Sherlock can feel the renewed pressure as John pulls his own cock out and he stops kissing John just so that he can look down between them and see it, thick and straining, a bright flushed red. Sherlock is mesmerised by the sight, of John's hands, broad and callused, hands he knows. They circle John's cock, covering the head, palm sliding against the bright line of precum and then slipping towards the base and circling, fingers tightening around it, and then his hand is moving, a steady pump of his fist and Sherlock watches, stares at John trying desperately to fuck his own fist, at the way his face goes loose and his eyes close and Sherlock doesn't realise he's turned them around until John is being pushed up onto the table, the backs of his thighs and his arse sending its contents shifting and falling noisily to the floor. He stares, wide-eyed and glazed, as Sherlock leans hungrily over him and snaps his teeth on John's bleeding lip.

"Make yourself come for me," Sherlock says. "Let me see you." And John groans, deep and helpless, and Sherlock watches that perfect, callused hand circle the head of that hard and aching cock. He watches as John's fist slides once, twice, before his hips start to stutter upwards, the red tip gleaming through his fingers as he pushes his cock up into his circling fist and with a cry that's torn from the base of his belly John comes, the streaks of his semen panting clear hot lines on Sherlock's stomach, dripping down both of their thighs.

He is shaking, mouth wide and gasping, and Sherlock leans into him, pulls John towards him with an urgency that has nothing to do with sex, and John collapses forward, lets himself be held. His face is pressed into the crease of Sherlock's shoulder and he is murmuring something, soft words Sherlock doesn't understand, interspersed with the incomplete syllables of his name, a tired, desperate litany, accented with something close to heartbreak. Sherlock doesn't know which of them moves first. He suspects it's himself, but it doesn't matter because as soon as one moves they are both moving, stumbling together, almost pulled along by the gravity of each other, limbs only barely obeying the impetus for forward motion. Sherlock doesn't care where they're going, only cares that he is loose-limbed and emptied, that he is warm, that John is here and isn't leaving.

Then they are in his bedroom, the sheets and blankets still tangled and dragged up, but neither of them care. John follows him there, or perhaps leads him there, and Sherlock falls into the chaos of last night's mess. He is aware of John, still standing, hesitating at the edge. Doesn't understand why, doesn't understand the look on his face, need and fear and desperation. But he hates it, he doesn't like it, and he reaches a hand out towards him, wrapping it around his wrist and pulling him down and just like that the look is vanished and Sherlock sees it, the transition between dark and light, and it's beautiful. It's beautiful.

“Don't go,” he says, and John smiles, the softest thing imaginable. The mattress dips and they are falling together, gravity pressing them into one another and Sherlock slides even closer, wrapping himself around John and after a moment he feels the pressure of John's leg, pushing underneath his and staying there.

“John.”

“Sherlock. Alright?”

“Hmmm. What did you do to me?”

“Always my fault, isn't it?”

Sherlock hums. “Just this once,” he says, and means it.


End file.
